When the Silver Line started last year the most glaring deficiency I saw in the proposed transit network in Tysons was the proposed 423 bus route. In September I broke down all the problems with the 423 route. The fact that from the most populous portion of North Tysons one can walk to Tysons Corner Station faster than ride the bus, even without the additional wait time to actually catch a bus.
It took a while to get things fixed, nearly an entire year, but thankfully Fairfax has finally corrected what was a mistake. I don’t blame the transportation planners, I blame those who took what was promised to be 4 bus circulators, turned them into 3, and thought there would be no ramifications in keeping the same access area.
The new route couples the dense Westpark and Jones Branch neighborhood directly to Tysons Corner Station. It does so with a 15-minute round trip lap which has almost no traffic related delay impacts by limiting the number of left turns and points of congestion. That is critical for many residents and office workers in North Tysons who are just outside of the 1/2 mile traditional walkshed. A transfer on the new 423 will average only 8 to 10 minutes including wait for those along Jones Branch Drive and only cost 50 cents.
Of course, all the improvements to the Tysons Circulator will only be compounded when Fairfax Connector gets up to speed with real-time GPS tracking and an app like NextBus which would let riders know exactly when to expect the bus and plan accordingly. It would be nice to have a few bus shelters where more than 5,000 people live and thousands of offices are located. We have been told these are also in the works.